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Some ideas gain traction after the sixth beer. Others need a joint. The best ideas of adolescence take shape with both, in a group of teammates passing a dagga pipe after the beer tent. Loose forwards drink like they scrum: messy.
Those late night ideas failed, but how majestic they sounded on the ear, in the cool, sodden Cape air.
Paul spawned the notion of buying a few dozen mice, affixing tiny parachutes to their squirming bodies, and softly tossing them from the projection room in the auditorium during morning prayers to set the school into panic.
Paul was an openside with sloped shoulders, so he had that kind of mind. Early onset of rugby brain.
The parachutes did not open. God, acting through his proxy, the principal and prefects, were not as amused as anticipated.
Our other flank conspirator, who usually went two-for-one on the beer ratio with Paul and me, had no ideas at all. Blindsides don’t. They just tie parachute to mice. And forget to open them. And chuck.
But this one Friday, I had the prank to end all pranks. It had layers, each corresponding to an empty bottle of dark beer. Number eights are visited by strange apparitions; it happens because they are less forward than other forwards except when in a bar with Catholic girls, but also, they have more time to ponder large ideas, and are often whispered to by diseased halfbacks, about the ancient longings of shorter men.
But I had an idea, as we leaned on the canvas tent, quite sloshed, and listened to the Bay City Rollers singing bye bye to their babies.
We would break into the bowling alley in Claremont, the only ten-pin place in Cape Town, on Main Road.
Why there? They had bowling balls; lots of them. Bad ones, too. Bowling balls they should discard, but didn’t. They gave those to the ‘non-European’ bowlers, who were on the other side of Main Road, in a tiny replica of the Cavendish alley.
Did I call us social justice warriors? No, I would’ve styled as Robin F—— Hoods.
And then?
We would each have three bowling balls in our three backpacks, and mount our 50cc Kawasakis to go to the drive-in theatre. Not to go in. But to park behind the screen.
At midnight, this being the only city in prudish South Africa that allowed blue movies, soft porn films were shown on the tall screen. It was tall enough to see from the second floor of our flyhalf’s house, but who wanted to watch naked people with a flyhalf?
So, I unwrapped my plan on how to use our pilfered bowling balls. I told conch-shelled Paul and massive monosyllabic Johan: “We can climb up, hey. The back of the screen. One, two, up. No worries.”
Johan asked ‘why’ with his eyes.
“Then, we drop the bowling balls on the wankers in the cars!”
“They gonna catch us!” noted Paul, as he sucked on the pipe, and watched some jeans bounce by.
“No boet. There’s a wall in between the screen and the park. And behind the screen it’s just bush. It’s strange, man. We can bowl, then be down and gone in the bush one time, hey.”
Johan nodded. What was he agreeing with? We will never know. Paul put his thumb up, as he broke away from our planning scrum, and did what all good opensiders do: chase the prettiest players on the field.
Thus, the great caper was set. All we had to do was keep drinking until midnight, pick up three backpacks from Johan’s garage, and whiz over to the bowling alley, which closed at midnight. Johan and I slammed Carlsbergs, and hunted for Paul.
After a few more dops from the bota bag of rum in Johan’s pocket, and a long snoggy goodbyes to girls with liberal numbers and tolerant senses of smell, we were on our weak dirt bikes.
Now let me say, in our defence: we were young, silly, drunk, a bit daft, and full of hormonal ennui.
It was 30 minutes after midnight, and eight hours before our match against Rondebosch, when we parked our buzzy bikes at the leafy square.
We lifted Johan to the lofty cracked window like illegal lineout operators, wobbling under his thick mass and the weight of our young beers.
He fell into the building. Then we stood, waiting in the cold, with open backpacks, under the window. Johan was going to throw the balls out. “Here it comes!”
A tiny security vehicle rounded the corner. The mustachioed man peered at Paul and me. We waved.
He stared. Then, he waved, and kept driving, just as the first bowling ball sailed out and hit Paul in the back, who swore impressively.
A few minutes later, we had our nine liberated balls. They seemed new. Spotless. In fact, they were.
Robin Hood probably made a few mistakes in his targets, too. Not every victim was a fat friar.
We reached the drive-in as the raunchy flick was reaching its first of many plot denouements. Hearing the amplified panting and slapping and spooging from a hundred car speakers made us giggle.
We climbed up, at almost the same rate, up the trellises and buttresses of the giant screen. Who can stop young lads trying to find trouble?
What cracked logic had led me to this point?
Reaching the top, we stared at the tops of the randy cars.
We realised there was no way we could throw a bowling ball far enough to hit a car. But oh how we tried.
With the seventh throw, I hit the roof of the tuck shop. Paul followed with a smashing hurl: taking out a pole with an unused sound system.
A torch shone at us. Shouting mixed with ecstatic utterances.
Down we slid and slipped, to our bikes. Nobody even came close to catching us. Kicking and starting and bzzzzzzing away, we made our escape, to the dark fields of our own grand old school.
By this time, we had sobered up a bit. So it was time for the captain’s run. The dewy pitch our dreamscape.
The last bowling ball had to serve as a rugby ball. Johan had unimaginably kept it. A few lengths later, I threw up.
We anointed the cricket pitch with a territorial puddle. And left the last bowling ball under the high jump bag.
Then it was g’night, see you in the morning in our togs.
We would have a good match, as a trio. Johan tackled sickly, silently. Paul was everywhere, with his sticky hands. I scored a try, from a dribbling kick through and fall on the ball. The game was won by oranges, allowing plenty of biff in the second half.
We were not good boys. We were classic loose forwards: a bit worrisome, erratic, and lost. But then it was back to ideation over a beer or three.
What if we could get Miss Lennett’s Mini Minor inside the tennis courts?
Join The Roar rugby editor Christy Doran, former Wallaby Matt Toomua and a cast of regular and special guests as they look at the biggest issues in the game on The Roar Rugby Podcast. If you’re looking for great odds on the next game check out Aussie bookmaker PlayUp. Chances are you’re about to lose. Set a deposit limit.